His Brown Eyes
by The Falling Fangirl
Summary: "Life isn't a movie, kid." Despite the thousands of movies they've watched on the floors of their bedrooms through the years. Life isn't a movie, but this one might as well be. Lon'qu/Robin Modern!AU COMPLETE :)
1. Chapter One

**A/N: HI! I apologize for any spelling/grammar mistakes, they aren't my strongest. I have attempted to keep the characters as in-character as possible. But anyway... ENJOY!**

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When she's eight, he's thirteen, and Gods, he's so stupid.

He's looking for the world of him like there's anywhere else he'd rather be in his scuffed grey Converse and his faded ALTEA t-shirt, his bored expression and the sun too hot on his brown hair, but really, she's feeling it, too, and she recognizes it just a little though she does want to be here - she does, it's just this place is new, and she isn't quite used to it yet. Isn't quite used to having a family since the nice couple that came to the Orphanage introduced themselves to her and said how they always wanted a daughter and hugged her and were nicer to her than the other children ever were.

She loves her new family, she really, really does, it's just a little frightening here in this new town with Mom's old friend and her strange husband and their even stranger son.

This is a nice neighborhood, and here she has her very own room with her very own bathroom her new Dad said she'd be happier with when she grew up a bit, grew up because they were here to stay in this nice neighborhood with her family and her small bag of things and the moving truck Mom complains is two days late already. But without any furniture in their new house, they've gotten to eat Chinese food (which she's never had but loves just maybe more than anything) on the kitchen floor and cereal out of plastic cups because that's all they have.

It's really not much, but to Robin - well. She thinks she's going to like this. A lot. Her dad said he'd let her drive in about eight years he quickly had to add 'cause Mom was giving him a look she's starting to recognize as something fond and warm before they'd hold hands over the console of their small silver car, and this is really nice.

It's been six months with them since the day she got to leave the orphanage, and well, she thinks with all the smiling pretentiousness of a young girl, that she's never been closer to God 'cause she's prayed a lot for a family to pick her up and want to keep her. Her dragon toy's prayed a lot with her, too.

But meeting new people that genuinely seem to care for her, and so many of them like bold boy from a street down that introduced himself as Chrom with his friend Frederick and his two sisters were a little too much too fast too nervous for her.

All but this boy Lon'qu who looked really distressed and annoyed when his Mom made him introduce himself.

His name is Lon'qu. He sarcastically hopes she likes it here, and Mister Ronkuu laughs and puts his arm around his shoulders. "We're your neighbors," he says just in case she missed it, and when she realizes she hasn't been paying much attention to anything but the streets and all the houses and the few people she can see living life (one of them with a dog(!) she's too afraid to ask for just yet, please), she flusters just a bit.

"I'm very happy to meet you," she pipes up politely, and the way her parents smile at her makes her real happy.

Miss Ke'ri asks if she enjoys it here yet along with several other questions, and yes, strawberry ice cream (after her first time trying it last night after she thought the frozenness of it would kill her), I love school, that'd be great! Except when she asks what her favorite color is, she accidentally answers with black instead of her preferred palette of purple, and Lon'qu finally looks at her with his brown eyes bright like he's just noticed she's there. That any of them are there. That he's outside.

He's so weird.

"Can I go yet?" he asks, loud enough to be heard, quiet enough for her parents to pretend that's not rude and for her dad to smile at Mister Ronkuu with a "what can you do?" look that smiles at the corner of their eyes.

"If you're back for dinner," Miss Ke'ri relents, but it isn't a chore to let him go, and he hugs her before he starts off with Mister Ronkuu realizing he'd nicked his sunglasses off of him four seconds too late.

The adults start to talk more grown-up things like.. she doesn't know, milk prices or the possibility of Superman actually being real or something, she isn't listening. Miss Ke'ri invites them over for dinner, though, in a couple hours that fly by super quick 'cause her parents take her with them shopping for things they have yet to get yet, like shower curtains and garbage bags and a package of oatmeal raisin cookies 'cause Dad catches her staring at them and adds them to their cart with an indulgent smile on his face, and then he even lets her choose the color of their bathroom rugs.

She picks bright yellow. Her dad makes a face that scrunches his eyes under his glasses (and it'll take another three more months before she can identify what she or her Mom do to bring that look on and another seven years before every choice she makes as a teenager will bring that same fond, incredulous look back) though he doesn't say anything, and her Mom says that yellow's her favorite color, that they'll look so pretty with the plastered sea shell wallpaper already decorating their bathroom walls, and she'll realize later that yellow isn't her Mom's favorite color at all. It's just the kind of thing she'll realize mothers do or say, and that's really nice, too.

When it's finally time to go back home and next door to the Chon'sin, Mister Ronkuu is wearing a funny apron that says "Kiss the Cook" that Miss Ke'ri ignores every time he manages to obnoxiously catch her eye, and they're so funny! Mom tells all them stories about when she and his were younger and collaged education or something - a crazy time in their lives that makes Dad scoff and Mister Ronkuu laugh even more than he already seems to do, but the topic changes quick and easy before she can seem to catch up. They're talking about movies next, all the ones she's seen which.. no. She hasn't seen that many, really. Not any.

It's then she sorta indirectly learns her parents aren't really television people, whatever that means, but they encourage her to go look at Mister Ronkuu's and Miss Ke'ri's collection of VHS tapes when they offer she can borrow anything she'd like to see. Nothing rated R, he jokes, whatever that is. Miss Ke'ri doesn't laugh.

She's heard of the wonder of Mister Walt Disney, whoever he is, but there's - there's so many, and making these important decisions? All she's had to choose so far have been which vegetable she'd like them all to eat for dinner or which clothes she'd like to wear that day.

So she's standing and staring at all these movies when the front door opens (a different sound than the sliding back door where everyone else is, she remembers), and it's all of two seconds before he speaks.

"You're the girl?" It's Lon'qu, and when she looks, he's already taken off his shoes and socks and left them not-so-neatly by the door. She frowns, and he thinks it's a little like she's turning her nose up at him, and that makes him laugh.

"My name is Robin," she says stubbornly, confusedly. She didn't even know how to begin to work a VCR, but her dad would probably help her.

"Yeah, the girl," he shrugs, moving across the carpeted living room to the side of the television where the shelf of movies she's browsing are. "What are we looking for?"

"You're Lon'qu, right?"

"We met," he says off-handedly, just a little rudely since he doesn't say her name, she thinks, and he looks startled when she tells him so. "You're annoying."

"You were first," she protests mildly, but he laughs again, asks her what all movies she's seen. "None."

He squats to take a better look at the bottom shelf, to bring himself a bit closer to her height to get a good look at this poor sheltered kid that probably has it way worse than him, but then he sorta just shrugs again. "None," he repeats, like he doesn't believe it. "What do you do, then?"

She really likes the Barbies her Mom bought for her. She likes Ken's red Corvette her dad found on the EBay better, though. "Not much."

"Huh. Well. Start with this," he tells her. He pulls out a movie from the very bottom left corner. The Wizard of Oz.

"What's it about it?" she asks him when he hands it to her, her eyes a little too intent on those sparkling red shoes.

"It's about the Wizard of Oz."

"I could have guessed," she huffs, and he rolls his eyes, suddenly all attitude.

"How old are you anyways?" He hands her more titles, all animated it looks like. The Great Mouse Detective. The Little Mermaid. The Lion King. Braveheart. The Land Before Time. She thinks he holds that one a little too possessively, a little too long.

"..You can keep that one," she says awkwardly, half-trying to give it back, half-watching the long-necked dinosaur on the cover walk towards the waterfall. "I'm almost nine."

"No, keep it," he mutters. He glances back to it, though. "I haven't watched in awhile, I'd almost forgotten." And while he's acting a little sad about it, he gives her another film. Jurassic Park. "That should start you off. Then you watch Jaws."

"Isn't that the shark?"

"You seen it?"

She shakes her head. "Heard of it." He doesn't look as impressed. They go quiet, and looks to the pictures on the walls of Mister Ronkuu and Miss Ke'ri and Lon'qu and several others, all growing up, all young again. She likes this, too. "Are we gonna be friends?" she asks him, that innocent, hopeful way only children can manage sometimes that's more endearing than annoying.

Or not.

"Nope," he says lightly, and his smile's not much of a smile when he nudges her arm, gets back up on his feet. "Not with you."

And it's the type of refusal she doesn't want to think about, isn't thinking about, strangely, in terms of family and friendship and how much she wants to stay here. She's just thinking he's annoying and a bit stupid and not very nice at all.

So she shoves him, hard, and he doesn't laugh.

Her dad does, though, when the reason Mister Ronkuu's had trouble with the charcoal all this time is because it's a gas grill.

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 **A/N: Sooooooo, you like? If so, please tell me! It would mean the world to me. Stay tuned for a new chapter on Wednesday! :)**


	2. Chapter Two

When she's about to be eleven, he's already fifteen.

She conned him into taking her to see _Twilight Eclipse_ since when she asked her dad, he regretfully told her teen vampire romances just weren't for him. He had a reputation to uphold. _Days of our Lives_ was the extent of his miscellaneous romantic drama addiction.

"Pretty sure you could ask one of those boys always following you around," he teased, just like a dad. "Lon'qu has his permit. That Chrom kid has his license, doesn't he?"

It happened when she was helping her mom put groceries away one day. Chrom was walking past them before oh-so-chivalrously offering his help and a grin too charming for such an already handsome face; all the girls at school talked about how cute he was, and it made her cheeks turn pink when her dad thanked Chrom for helping his women.

And then he proceeded to tell her that a guy like that is one she'll want to marry when she's forty-three or so.

No, thank you.

Except that stuck with her when Lon'qu would always take her bag when he picked her up from school, and oh, God, his eyes were still the brownest she'd ever seen, and sometime in all the annoying days and movie nights with either of their families and late night study sessions when biology was ruining her life and her GPA, she started to maybe kinda like his rare smile and his mood swings and how he only likes to drink soda at room temperature and knows more lyrics to Taylor Swift songs than he'll admit.

She has it pretty bad.

Lon'qu and Ronkuu were arguing in the backyard when she hangs on her side of the fence and interferes between the words difficult and why.

"Hey," she calls lightly, unsure if she should be smiling or not.

Mister Ronkuu smiles, though, and Lon'qu steps back, rocks back on his heels, flexes his fists. "Hey."

"I need to borrow him," she tells Ronkuu, but as much as he looks like he wants his son out of his hair for a bit, he shakes his head.

"Sorry, kid. He's about to be grounded." His hands are tied where Lon'qu's are itching to run and burn, and they both look so done, it's almost funny.

"Not even so he can take me to see _Twilight_?" She grins hopeful and helpful and just looking at Ronkuu since his son's glowering at her with his dark eyes and his dark shirt radiating righteous indignation beneath all this sun, his head already shaking no, he's not gonna do that.

Ronkuu can't stop laughing. He doubles over and chokes and slaps his knee, his eyes shining. "That's better punishment than I can think of," he guffaws, giving her a trademark Chon'sin smirk.

"You're kidding," Lon'qu huffs, stomping inside and slamming the screen door.

Ronkuu gives her an apologetic what can you do? look. "Also, Robin?"

"Yeah?"

"If you could.. talk to him," he blurted, sounding doubtful somehow, "I'd be interested in hearing what he'd say. You two do that talking thing, right?"

"Uh, yes," she answers, more question? Than it should be? "We talk."

"Right."

"Mmhmm."

"We do the talking thing, too," he explains, shielding his eyes from the sun.

"Right."

The Myrmidon's horn blares loudly from the front, so she awkwardly waves and leaves Mister Ronkuu looking confused in the backyard.

Chrom's leaning on the dark faded blue of the ancient old car passed down to Lon'qu hesitantly by Ronkuu, but Chrom - well, he became a fixture in that house ever since his parents had died and his two sisters went to live with their mom's parents, Chrom with their Dad's.

He's very Neville Longbottom. Except he's sixteen and almost as cute as Lon'qu, she thinks, and is.. getting into the passenger seat.

"What are you doing?"

"What?" he shrugs, giving her an excited grin. "I wanna know who Bella chooses."

"Read the book," Lon'qu tells him in a grated voice.

Chrom laughs because he's used to it, though, because they're bestest friends and Chrom makes best friends with everyone because he's that kinda guy, so he turns down the screaming music playing, scoots his seat up so her knees have room when she climbs in the backseat.

"You've read them?" she giggles, so bright it makes Lon'qu put on his black-framed aviators after glaring at her in the rear view mirror.

"Maybe," he frowns, unbudging. When she reaches up, fingers millimeters away from his head, he takes the hint and passes her his sunglasses. "When's this movie start?"

"Half an hour."

"Oh, my God."

"Were you and your dad arguing?"

"Next question, Robin," he snaps.

For a second, she thinks he might be more sad than mad, but it could just be the lens of his sunglasses tricking her eyes. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"That's a nice tree right there," Chrom points out tactfully.

"Gardening."

"..What?"

"We started arguing about gardening," he goes on, sneering at the windshield, swerving on the road just a little.

"Easy buddy," Chrom cautions.

"You want me to hit that squirrel next time?"

"Wait," she says, because she's missing something obvious surely. "Gardening? Neither of you garden."

"I know."

"Look at that streetlamp."

"Chrom-" Lon'qu starts to shake his head, but then he starts to laugh and can't stop. "This better be a good movie."

"It can't be better than _Star Wars_."

"It can't be worse than _Star Wars_ ," she corrects just to make Chrom startle all offended.

Lon'qu smirks at her in the mirror, and she feels pretty cool.

And pretty disappointed. Agreeing to marry Edward definitely isn't permission to kiss Jacob. Or cuddle Jacob in a tent in the middle of a snowstorm. Why even agree to marry Edward? Why be young and beautiful forever? Why keep wearing that hideous jacket? Why give up all your morality for a stupid vampire with a history of bias serial killing? Why even the prejudice against the rest of the stupidity in the world?

Those are all the things Lon'qu hissed in her ear during the movie. And he laughed a lot and got bunches of people staring and Chrom throwing Twizzlers at him.

It's not 'till a little later that they really get to talk. They drop Chrom off at his gramp's and laugh when he shouts, "I love you nerds!" at them, continue home to a yellow house and a blue house side by side.

She unbuckles her seatbelt, unconsciously waiting for him to open his door before she does. Maybe she's just used to it with her parents, but when he stays there gripping the wheel tight, Myrmidon in park, she turns in her seat to face him. "Not ready to go in?"

"No." He shakes his head before leaning against the headrest and looking at her. And because he's still Lon'qu, he smiles like a dopey idiot. "Think he's still mad?"

She doesn't really get it, the arguing-with-parents thing. Maybe when she gets a little older. Maybe it's because she didn't think she'd ever have any, so why fight them? Except Frederick never argues with his parents. Oh. "He's probably worried you're still mad."

"He's an idiot sometimes."

"And he probably thinks you are," she smiles only a little timidly. "It's all part of growing up."

"Think it ever goes by too quick?" he says, like he's.. like he's so ready to just go and get out of here, far away from anything that's a picket fence and his too understanding mom and the pressures of everything that's being fifteen and angry and a dark sky that's more scalding than starry.

"I don't know," she answers truthfully. Quietly. She gives him his sunglasses back, and she thanks him for driving her when he didn't really want to. "Life's so hard for you," she teases him, and he reaches over her, opens her door.

"You're walking next time."

"But there's two more movies," she laughs, stepping out when he does. He says a curse she's too scared to repeat, slamming his door closed three times before it latches. "Thanks again."

"Sure, kid."


	3. Chapter Three

Grow up, she tells herself in the mirror.

First she stands up taller, then she strikes a pose. She tries not to frown at her reflection, tries not to scrutinize every inch of herself in the mirror.

Her mom says she's becoming a woman, and she can't get it out of her head that Chrom said she sprung up like a weed over the summer like that really means anything coming from him and not her older, unfairly adorable crush, so grow up she tells herself, grow up and get older so things are more probable and possible. It isn't fair.

He needs to grow down, wait.

 **::::::::::::::::::::::::::::**

"Hey," she says quietly sometime between fourteen and fifteen. They're laying on his bedroom floor since both their parents are gone working or whatever, and well, he's long since stopped pretending to be annoyed when she'd come bother him. Sometimes he hates his parents and all his friends and sometimes her, but not really, never not really, except she sorta hates him. She hates him.

If you're a woman, you understand.

He doesn't look up from where he's working on the English paper he's said is worth more than half his grade and a requirement to graduate, and he's so studious laying there on a pillow, crafting theses and sentence structure. He has a bad habit of chewing on his pens, of biting his lip when he concentrates, but aside from that, she doesn't know much else.

That's a lie, actually.

She knows everything about him from how he likes to drink his soda when it's warm temperature, how he really, really likes political science but not as much as he thinks he'll like engineering instead of simple mechanic work like his dad. But he helped him repair the Myrmidon, coincidentally the car he inherited as a gift when he was sixteen, weeks and weeks of years of the effort spent slaving shirtless in the summer heat with Ronkuu.

And she's seen Lon'qu shirtless every time she's closed her eyes since she was eleven, can predict precisely when he'll roll his eyes or laugh genuinely or say something stupid. For three years, he's been her best friend, and for two, she fancied herself in love with him and his brown eyes and the old music he loves when he isn't pretending to like angsty emo bands. He swears her parents like him more than his own do, and he's weirdly obsessed with always playing the banker in Monopoly, hides cigarettes in his desk drawer, called her for the very first time from a pay phone three towns away because he didn't know what I'm doing, Robin. I just wanna talk.

She's not sure how she convinced him to come back home - she's even less sure he even knows - in the middle of the night before his parents could worry. It was last year, and he wore a lot of eye liner, and his long, pale fingers were cold when he'd rasped his knuckles on her bedroom window.

She opened it after eventually swearing to not because it was way late, because he was so clueless it caused her heart physical pain, but after a mouthed argument and him nearly falling off the thing with the vines he'd climbed and scaled to make it up to her room, she let him in. And tried not to think about _The Lost Boys_ and _Salem's Lot_ since they watched them recently.

He kicked off his all black Converse, left them next to her flip flops. He dropped his patched backpack by her desk. His eyes were so gaunt. He said it was all too much, that he didn't know who else to call.

She tried to stop that from getting to her head (heart). She asked him why he came back, then, he said he didn't know, but she thought it was a lie. She let him have it. And her fluffy pillow even though he looked like an idiot standing there towering over her and awkward and uncomfortable in her very girly, very pink bedroom. It wore her heart a little more down. That, and his love of Chinese food. Beijing beef with rice and four egg rolls. Only one fortune cookie.

"Hey," she says again since he isn't listening. His small TV's so quiet playing General Hospital that she can hear the scratch of his pen guided by his elegant penmanship. "Lon'qu."

He hums noncommittally in response, and when she hits him with her purple painted toes, he doesn't even flinch.

"Lon'qu, hey. Lon'qu."

"What do you want now?" He says it like a tease, a distracted one, like he's still really not annoyed she had to call him the other night since her parents went on a dinner date and she was starving. So he drove her to McDonald's with none the wiser, and she - she just blurts it, summons up all the dregs of her bravery to coincide her curiosity.

"Have you ever done it?"

And he accidentally drags his pen across his research essay when his elbow gives out beneath him. "What?"

Oh, that instant regret. All the things she can't bring herself to say everyday, so passive in her life, a pretentious spectator wall-flowering her own novella of an existence, but she can ask Lon'qu if he's ever kissed someone? "Nevermind," she says quickly, turning her red face quickly back to the TV. God, take her now.

"Have I ever what?" he repeats, hissing like he just can't believe it. "And you're lucky this isn't the final draft," he just has to add, piling onto her humiliation.

"Forget about it, I said."

"Ever.. killed someone? Seen a more ridiculous soap opera? Done drugs?"

"Why was killing someone your first - nevermind," she huffs, pulling herself up to sit all cross-legged, all arms crossed awkwardly.

He lets it go for only a few seconds that she can tell since he's so focused on his paper, and she's free to watch while his dark eyebrows crease together and his teeth bite at his bottom lip idly. At least until he looks up to watch her, his pale face unreadable. "Are you really asking if I've been kissed?" he asks, and God, he needs to not smirk.

"No. Maybe, yes." She curls her fingers through her hair in a fit, very obviously shuffles her brown mess of two days unwashed waves so she's shielding her reddening face a bit. "What other kind of it would I mean?"

"Who knows," he laughs, and he really laughs like he always used to always, has started to again around her. There's a pinch of nervousness she thinks she recognizes, though, and the tips of his ears are red. "Maybe I have. Have you?"

She shrugs her shoulders half-heartedly, tries really, really hard not to think about his probably pretty and nice girlfriend. Her name starts with an O or Olivia something, she tries hard not to listen when he tells Chrom about her. "I haven't," she finally says. It isn't some great secret.

"Oh."

"Oh?" she repeats offensively. What was that supposed to mean? She throws her pillow at him. After he screams, he throws it back harder, and he scoffs at the shocked look on her face.

"Nevermind."

"You have to tell me now," she whines, because maybe it could mean something terribly important like all their conversations do to her when she absolutely doesn't think about all of them after they've happened. "You can tell me anything."

"Right," he says. But almost he doesn't. Won't for a couple years now.

She pffts at him. "Your face is all red, y'know."

"So's yours."

"If you can't talk about it without blushing, then I don't think you've really - stop!" she shrieks, because he's grinning like an idiot and reaching for her ankle and tickling the arch of her foot and she can't breathe.

He's laughing, and she's shrieking trying to kick with her other foot, but when did he get so strong and why is he so relentless? And God, her cheeks are wet and her chest is cracking in all these giggles gasping from her mouth, but then his hands are splayed over her ribs to tickle her sides viscously, and he's relenting, cause her Grandpa Validir's dog, Grima is licking Lon'qu's face.

She starts laughing even more as Lon'qu tries to bat the fat dog away.

"He probably smells the bacon you ate for breakfast." She teases him.


	4. Chapter Four

When she's still a freshman and he's still a senior, it's really.. weird. Their strange bunch of friends.

Chrom's got a day off from training, Lon'qu sighed and rolled his eyes and complained the entire ride to the first football game of the season to see Frederick play. He's looking indifferent like he's dying in the sunlight, but he crosses his left ankle over his knee the same second Ronkuu does, and he should really join them at the table for meals instead of just holidays.

"Alright," Ke'ri says loudly so they're all sorta huddling on the center stadium bench, all leaning and bumping each other's shoulders. "Remember that -" She has to stop to snap Ronkuu's attention away from glowering at the enemies on the opposite side of the field. "Bring it back, hon. Bring it back. Refocus."

"Ke'ri," he groans, all flustered and emasculated. Until she pats his knee, and it's sweet even when Lon'qu rolls his eyes and Chrom makes a face.

"Remember that we, Ronkuu, Chrom," she continues pointedly with a fixed look, "do not make fun of the other team. Or our team. We don't need a repeat of the band incident."

"The band incident?" Lon'qu asks. He'd gone out with his friends that day.

"It's not my fault."

"Shh, Ronkuu."

"It's Chrom's fault."

"I didn't know that kid's parents were behind us!" he shouts, holding up his pompoms.

"He was a lousy trombone player anyway," Ronkuu grumbles snidely.

"Anyone seen Frederick's mom?"

"I see Chrom's gran."

"You're joking," he pales.

"Crazy old hag," Lon'qu says the same instant Ronkuu calls her a crazy old bat. There's a second where they lock eyes and grin, same bone structure and everything, but then he's going up to look for his friends and a flash of her phone says her mom's minutes away from pulling in.

"So," Ke'ri smiles, gentle with crinkles at the corners of her eyes, "where's this boy you think is cute? Remember I know his name, his hair color. I could probably get Frederick's mom to get his social security number, too."

"Yeah," Robin giggles, nervous and short. She points to a boy standing just off the field, one she's never seen before, and the stadium erupts in cheers. Their team's running out. Number 1 waves wildly in their general direction, Frederick, and she and Chrom and Ronkuu and Ke'ri scream and clap and stand up to scream louder.

Chrom still knows every word to the cheerleaders' chants, oh, God.

There's a stomp on the bleachers next to her, dark blue Converse, and when Lon'qu bumps into her, he smells like nicotine and popcorn and autumn and holds his drink out to her. "Anyone get knocked out yet?"

"Yeah," she says, except no - they didn't - but yeah.


	5. Chapter Five

"I suddenly feel too old for this," she tells Chrom.

"That's just 'cause people are staring."

"At you."

That makes him laugh. "But you're the one that wanted to come to the mall."

"I need a dress."

"Who asks you to prom on Halloween?" he frowns. A little kid gapes at him from the Chic-Fil-A line when they pass it, so he smiles and waves so adorably in his legit Superman costume. She really wants to know where he got that cape.

"His name is Gaius, I think," she shrugs, tugging at the hem of her Wonder Woman blue star-patterned skirt. They're so much cooler than the other sophomores and juniors their age.

"You think?"

She waves a hand dismissively. "Be nice."

"She doesn't have a kryptonite, Clark," he mutters, so sassy he's almost Frederick, so dorky he's almost Lon'qu.

"I never thought my first couple's costume would be a DC comic," she laughs, taking hold of his arm.

"Please, everyone knows Wonder Woman's in love with Batman," he pffts. "Frederick offered to dress as Lois Lane for me, but I just had to turn him down."

"Broke his heart, you did."

"He'll get over it. The races has kept him pretty busy."

"Have you talked to him recently?" she means to ask. He's just pulled away by a pretty girl with red hair asking for a picture. They look adorable, and he's as dazzling as Clark Kent ought to have been.

Maybe Lois always knew Clark was Superman all along, just in the sense that he was something special. Not in any particular way, maybe, just that no one was ever as bright as he was in the world or her entire life, even when he was joking with Jimmy and drinking coffee in the morning, his hair all a mess on the days even gods wanted to sleep in. Maybe that made it hurt less when he'd leave? No one else could really measure up to him.

She's an idiot.

Chrom high-fives a kid on his way back to her, but then his attention fully focused again so he can nod. "Still racing his horses. I don't see him much, but we talk a lot still. He tries to get me to ride one, but.. hah," he snickers, and they're both a giggling fit in front of Hot Topic.

She laughs despite herself, finally letting go of his arm since he's walking finally. "Chrom, you're something else."

"Yep," he grins all toothy and bright. "Any idea what kind of dress you want?"

"Nothing sparkley," she decides after a minute. "What color's your girl wearing?"

"Pink."

"Oh, goodness."

"I know."

They're browsing the racks in Penny's for either the really hideous ones or the pretty ones that shouldn't intimidate her when she's strapless Wonder Woman right now. Oranges, pinks, mint greens, metallic grays. Too many different lengths, styles - she really wishes her mom or Ke'ri were here for pep talks and brilliant advice. Not that Chrom isn't great, 'cause he is. He just keeps picking out yellow.

There's a dark blue dress she really likes, however, and when she holds it up for his opinion, he pretends to swoon. "Go try it right now."

So she does, and she doesn't know how she's gonna get her styled Wonder Woman hair to look as perfect as the first time, but the dress is a fit, floor length, flaring just a little, tapered at the waist with this pretty floral pattern stitched in silver over the bodice. And it zips on the side! Bonus!

When she steps out, Chrom falls dramatically silent. It's one of those movie moments except Batman's standing next to him and they awkwardly stare at each other.

"I wish I was Bruce right now," he finally says, and it - they all crack up, because that's Lon'qu smiling beneath the Batman mask, and oh, she's gonna kill Chrom.

"You're beautiful," he adds, ever so wise, "but you're not gonna be able to dance if the hem touches the floor."

"The hem," Lon'qu mocks, swishing his black cape for good measure. "You're so pretentious."

"Thank Teen Scene Magazine."

"What the fuck."

"She dances like a flamingo."

"I know," Lon'qu chokes, nearly knocking over a rack of gowns.

"Find me dresses," she interjects, grinning at the both of them. They're both so sweet and heroes and Lon'qu - her cheeks are aching from smiling. He looks really good.

Chrom brings her the frilliest, pinkest dress out there as a joke when Lon'qu brings her the shortest black one as a joke, and she tries on both, just doesn't step out of the cramped three-foot room. It's Lon'qu that finds the perfect dress that's the one, though. It's purple and drops just below her knees and twirls really easily which she loves.

It's perfect.

Chrom snaps a picture of her on her phone so she can send it to her mom, and he's such a good friend saying she looks exquisite while Lon'qu says she looks really weird.

"Gorgeous," she tries to get him to say. He just stares at her.

It's kinda cool walking out with everyone staring at Superman and Batman and her, but she won't say it.


	6. Chapter Six

When she's months away from seventeen, he's twenty-one, and his knuckles are white where his fists are clenching the steering wheel of the Myrmidon tight.

Anger is making him tense and rigid, all harsh lines in his hoodie that smells faintly of cigarettes, and she called him because she didn't know who else to call, really, though she got his voicemail twice before he finally answered.

"Want me to bail you out of prom?" he asked like he was mocking the very idea of it, which he was, but his thoughts were always so loud, and she could hear him in how quiet she was on her side of the line.

"Yeah," she finally said, "yeah." He pretended not to hear how her voice cracked since this wasn't as magical as she thought it'd be, the moment that would define her high school years and be as fun as taking those pictures in her front yard was. She didn't say what happened over the phone, but he got the gist of it when he pulled up to the old parking lot and honked the horn at her 'cause he's an ass.

He didn't see the sleeve of her pretty purple dress torn until she was opening the passenger side door and the ceiling lights blinded both of them, and oh, hell, no.

"I'll kill him," he decided then, all warmth from his voice gone to a chill that makes her cross her arms over her chest. "I swear to God I will, Robin. What's his name again?"

"No," she says weakly, and God, if she actually starts crying now, Jesus Christ. Her mom did her make-up for like half an hour. "He didn't tear my dress. Well," she pauses, 'cause technically he did but just to stop her to apologize after she hit him after he'd pushed her a little too roughly when she told him to stop trying to grope her against the lockers. "It wasn't -"

"Don't try to defend him," he snaps at her like she's just the stupidest girl ever. His arms are starting to shake. "That isn't fucking okay. What'd he do? Where the hell was that other friend of yours?"

"Frederick? He made the Homecoming Court," she mumbles off-handedly, sniffling just a little.

"Good for him."

"Lon'qu," she starts, only she just doesn't really know what to say. She really should have known better.

"Dammit, Robin," he curses. He takes a sharp breath, hisses through his teeth, tightens his grip on the steering wheel before he hits it and curves them roughly on the shoulder of the road. "Want me to kill him?" He sounds so innocent, so serious, she really can't.

"I already did," she mutters darkly. When he looks to her with half a heartbeat of real worry 'cause he can't afford to bail her out of jail, something in him flashes to pride and her anger softens to something sad and disappointed and really not surprised. She wipes at her nose, and that's when she realizes she's crying. "I punched him, Lon'qu. All I did was punch him."

"Where?" And God damn him, he's actually laughing when he slaps his knee in hysterics like his dad does sometimes. "No, don't cry," he hurries to say 'cause she's choking and sobbing and hiccuping and trying not to laugh, too, just crumbling to melodramatic pieces and actually snorting in giggles she can't help since he's so ridiculous. "Don't cry, sweetheart, don't," he laughs, unbuckling his seatbelt and pulling her close to him in seconds. He tucks her into him, feels her tears hot on his neck, and he could kill the bastard all over again.

She can sense him tense up before she can feel it, the anger taking him over bit by bit so his hug's gone rigid, so she throws her other arm over his shoulders, gets as close as she can in the cramped seats to maybe forget tonight was crap and really not worth it until now since he's warm and sighing and the boy next door she's had memorized since she was twelve, seen every time she's closed her eyes since she was ten. "Don't be mad," she whispers, like it'll work like a salve.

He's a deep breath, a bite to his okay. When he reaches up to touch her hair, it crinkles in all the hairspray keeping it stiff.

"You should have been my date instead," she mumbles when she forces herself to let go, to pull back, to just say it since there's not really any more room for secrets in this beat-up car with her smudged mascara and all his angsty bumper stickers. She flips the visor down to see just how bad her face is ruined and smudged even if she can't see much in the dark, but he - she turns her head to see him staring.

"There's lipstick on your teeth," he points out, his eyes darker, and oh, she thinks dumbly, shrugging off the disappointment with a nonchalant shrug of her shoulders to hide the frailty of her ego, that's why he was staring. "You don't want to go home yet, do you?"

"Not really," she answers quietly, drumming her fingers on the door for something to do, something else to think about.

"You want to go to that diner we go to?" he offers. The greasy one they go to lots after school with milkshakes and the best cheeseburgers and lots of good memories. "I can buy you cheese fries."

She takes another deep breath. "Yeah. Where were you anyways? Bar or garage?"

"Bar," he smiles tightly, one of the two jobs he's working to pay for his classes. Everything he is there that he really isn't, but it's a distraction, and she's just realized she's still half-holding onto his hand.


	7. Chapter Seven

**A/N: Thank you all so much for staying with this story! We're getting close to the end, I'm sad to say :(. I had a blast writing this story and I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoy writing it. ilysm**

* * *

She turns seventeen. He's still twenty-one.

He's been gone eight days.

He missed her birthday and the party and the six hour Monopoly game at McDonald's with Frederick and Chrom and his girlfriend, and she - she's not even that mad.

Robin's not.

It's not like she expected a phone call. No, definitely not when they talked most everyday. She wasn't disappointed not just for her but for his mom because she wasn't the only one he didn't bother contacting.

It didn't matter anyway. He was probably with his friends or a stupid girl on her fucking birthday, getting drunk or high or angry or less and less worth all the time she spent thinking the world in his brown eyes.

He knocks on her bedroom window tonight, though, just shows back up like he'd never left, and she considers leaving him to freeze out there until he looks really pale and really sorry and she has no choice. She lets him in.

He's awkward at first like he always is, looking like he doesn't belong in here with old stuffed animals and VHS tapes she never got around to returning since DVDs were taking over the world. Maybe he doesn't fit here, and she's ready for a half-decent apology or anything he could say to make it better, so she crosses her arms over her chest as she stands up straighter to look more.. grown. Womanly. All a woman's wrath with a child's temper.

His chest rumbles with the husk of a low laugh that cuts through the air, slices through her, just has her covering her face and wanting to feel properly pathetic away from him, how mean he is since he never even knew, but her hands are fists shoving at his chest angrily, caught like nothing and held by him.

"Stop that," she warns, trying to tug her hands away.

His smirks tells her he probably knows she doesn't mean it, that he hasn't been clueless all these years she thought he was, and she can't even look at him. "I'm sorry I missed it."

"You can't just leave like that."

"Can't I?" he smiles. Really gentle, and he lets her shove at his chest again. "I didn't know it'd make you this upset."

"Of course you didn't."

"I wasn't gone that long."

"Your parents don't think so."

"My parents are used to me being gone." His smile isn't really a smile, but then he outright grins so big he's dopey and fifteen again and kicking his purple Converse next to a complicated looking pair of her shoes. "You should be used to me being gone."

"But you're never - no," she tells herself, tells him, presses both her hands to her eyes tiredly. "What are you even doing here, Lon'qu?"

"I wanted to say sorry."

"Sorry for what?"

His eyes are harsh and annoyed when she finally looks up, always up, but she sighs because it's half-three AM and his right hand's knuckles are bruised, and God, what did the world ever do to make him so insufferable. He makes a step towards her like it's a precise, calculated accident, says it through his teeth where she feels it under her ribs. "I'm sorry I'm late."

"It could have waited until morning," she just has to point out, her brown eyes still looking at her purple rug.

"Will you just shut up," he laughs too warm to be too annoyed. He doesn't stop her from trying to smack his chest again; he just cups her face with his hands, tilts her chin up to kiss her soft and light and a breath that's stolen everything she wants to twist into forever, and he's kissing her.

And he kisses her.

His fingers are rough against her cheeks, but his lips are so soft, and she - she's staring at him wide-eyed and gasping when he pulls away, straightens up, drops his hands to her shoulders.

"That wasn't nice," she finally whispers, not if he's going to disappear again or be a jerk about it.

"It wasn't? I mean, I know there wasn't any tongue, but.."

"Go home," she smiles. Her cheeks are aching, and her skin feels so warm under the way he's looking at her.

"I'll see you tomorrow," he promises, and she's burning red, leaning towards him when he brushes his thumb over her cheek.

"Will I?"

"Not through a window," he admits or swears, a flustered hand through his dark hair before he's climbing out and into the darker sky.

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

A few hours later, he drives across town to his parents because she didn't ask him to.

He climbs into his old bedroom window after dodging the backyard sprinklers, thinks maybe he ought to clean the gutters and finally tend to the garden that caused so much strife.

His room is still angsty and fifteen years old, memories of Robin everywhere, and before he steps out, he takes the eye-liner and the smokes stashed away and trashes them. The second step from the top still creaks, and the fifth one from the bottom does now, too, and he suddenly feels guilty. He grew up here and the house got old without him all these years he spent running and resenting and eating in his room.

Oh, God.

He brings a yellow plate from the kitchen into the dining room like he's been doing it for years, never mind how long it's been since he moved out. Same place, right next to his mom, but his dad's standing next to it looking so cavalier and happy.

"We saved you a seat," Ronkuu says, and c'mon, dad, don't be an ass. He's grinning, though, and he doesn't miss the subtle way his eyes flicker behind him to his mom.

Then he realizes for the first time, probably, that he'd gotten taller than his old man just barely. Maybe an inch or three, not a whole lot, but when he's standing across from him for the first time in he doesn't know how long, it's.. he realizes he has to look down at him instead of on him, and he has been, and it doesn't feel right suddenly. It twists wrongly in his stomach, cuts jaggedly and twists in his chest cavity, and it's all so wrong. Feeling.

"I'm sorry," he tells them, a few years of being an awful son stuck to the roof of his mouth.

They both hug him at once.


	8. Chapter Eight

When she's twenty, the first time he tells her he loves her is accidentally over the phone.

It isn't like how Chrom ended every talk with his sisters and then his grandma with an automatic I love you that was programmed into him for years (which is good, all things considered) and passed onto nearly every conversation he had on the phone ever. She remembers being thirteen and hearing him tell her the good news that he'd just enlisted in the military only to go, "Alright, love you, bye," before he cursed at himself. First he was telling the pizza guy that he loved them when he called to order, then he was telling her, then he was telling Ronkuu who very dramatically responded with a love you, too, son that made Ke'ri hope it was Lon'qu on the phone.

Hah.

Hahaha.

That's really not very funny.

But before even the pizza guy, it was Lon'qu, and she honest to God remembers hearing him profess his love to someone on the other side of the phone and worrying it was a girlfriend.

But he just.. blurted it out. Like he meant it, not like it was an automatic habit he couldn't shake off like his smoking (though he cut back to only when he's nervous now which makes him even more obvious) or something thoughtlessly added just because. He wasn't even talking to her, it was a message since she'd forgotten to charge her phone again, and that - dear God, it's been three hours and seventeen - eighteen - minutes since then. What must he be thinking?

She's standing there in a blue towel in her old room in her parents' house, toothbrush forgotten in her mouth, her hair already starting to dry without being combed, and she's grinning at nothing, makes his deep voice play again on her phone.

 _"So I'm running late 'cause my boss is an ass. I'm sorry, I know, I'll be late for our dinner reservations but I'll still order the white chocolate cake so you can have some even if you decide to order three slices of chocolate cake while you're waiting for me. But remember you don't like white wine since you never do when they decide not to card you. I'll try not to be too late. I'm sorry in case I probably forget to tell you again later. I love you, y'know? I -"_

And that's where he pauses at the twenty-three second line and doesn't speak again for seven. He sounds so flustered, and she can just see him tearing his hand through his hair, cheeks all red, elbow smudging the lines he'd penciled in on his engineering plan thing.

 _"I wasn't gonna tell you like that. I'm an idiot. But I love you, probably have for years, and you should probably move in with me legally instead of like all my closet space and free use of my hair products, so -"_

And then it beeps because he's run out of time for his message, and she can see in her mind how horrified and angry at his phone he probably looked, and she plays the message again, curls up to squeal into her pillow like she's a girl again.

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

So she does legally move in with him, her name on the lease and everything.

Now there's more of her shoes in the closet and all her things in his place in boxes unpacked and fit randomly around the orderly chaos of his. Her toothbrush is next to his in a cute little pink ornate cup she brought, and there are dishes in the cabinets that don't really match, and their pillows are starting to smell more like her than just how intoxicating he smells with the floral aroma of Gain laundry detergent, and it's really nice. Perfect, even.

Whenever her dad really thinks about it, he says things like, "He was always such a good kid," in that weird approving way he's always supported her with. He wasn't really a good kid, but she knows what her dad means, that he's a good man, and her mom gives her this look like she knew it'd be like this all along, and well - his parents always loved her. They come over for dinner and eat Chinese take-out on their mismatched dishes often enough to drive Lon'qu a little crazy, but it's hilarious.

Except sometimes he forgets to call and some nights she wakes up to him smoking out the window like he wishes he was out there running through the biting air, and it's never really been worse since that one devastating fight that had her worried this was really it.

They argue a lot, sure, about stupid stuff that doesn't mean anything until he kisses his anger into her shoulder and leaves yellow flowers on the nightstand for the days he's being particularly trying and wondering why she's still here, maybe. They're far from perfect, but it feels like they are and will be.

Tonight, though, he left in a fit of dark red rage, slammed the door behind him with a force that shook the windowpanes, shattered her ribs.

She wasn't scared of him; it just hit her all at once that she was terrified of him storming out the door and never bothering to come back. The dish she was washing in the sink broke in her hands.

Eight minutes she stands lethargic in the open kitchen lights waiting for the slot of his key to sound his return, but each drawn out second of nothing makes this tiny house even smaller, even emptier. Her throat makes a cry when she sees his coat thrown over the chair in the living room where he left it with the burgundy scarf her mom knitted for him last Christmas, and because she's a woman, because she's independent, because she learned to quiet that hopeful part of her thirteen year old Robin wondering if he was the one each time he smiled at her with his ridiculous grin, she pushes her arms into his black coat's too long sleeves, hugs it around her and then.. well, it's sorta fabulous, and she really likes the ways it goes to her knees. When she finds Lon'qu, she's gonna try to keep it.

She opens the door ready to search everywhere for him, but the second of her eyes adjusting to the one AM dark shows him sitting on the steps of the porch. His shoulders are straight and broad, and his bare arms look cold around the tight sleeves of his company's polo shirt, and the red end of his cigarette is lighting a quarter of his face, catching in his dark eyes. She slowly plops herself next to him on the creaking wooden steps, hears him draw in a slow breath that warms her just a little.

"You didn't get too far," she says quiet, quieter since the sky is so still and silent and starry.

He shakes his head. "Nope."

She wants to ask if he's done running, if maybe he's just tired, if she's done anything to make him mad. She doesn't, just watches him toss his cigarette and turn to face her, their knees bumping.

"Kiss me," he tells her.

She shakes her head because she knows that tone of voice and the look in his eyes even if she can barely see them. He raises his hand to touch her cheek, so gentle still, so fucking cold, and he's so ridiculous. They both are. "But I'm mad at you," she protests lightly, only half-meaning it. She tilts her cheek in his hand to kiss his rough palm, and it's so easy to lean into him when he opens his arms. "You can't just kiss my anger away."

"Then stop kissing mine," he huffs. As cold as his skin is, his mouth's so warm. He tastes like smoke and temperament and wholesomeness and the rest of her life.


	9. Chapter Nine

She's twenty-one and spent an hour trying to decide between the blue dress or the green dress or the light grey dress.

Chrom's getting married to a woman he works with in the military, a woman he describes as lovely and perfect and beautiful and sweet and loves horses and everything he ever wanted but never found in the pizza guy. Her name's Sumia, and she's such a sweet person, oh, goodness, she instantly loves her and knows they've found true love in each other.

Lon'qu scoffed in his fist when she toasted something similar to them at the rehearsal, but he's the one that's standing up there with Chrom on his big day, so the joke's all on him. She has a spot in the first row next to his grandma and Lissa and Emmeryn, and all of her men just look exquisite ties and black coats and coordinating colored pocket handkerchiefs. The day is sunny and beautiful and perfect weather for riding a horse, Sumia says, but perfect weather for a wedding, too, because it's perfect and lovely and she's crying and Lon'qu keeps looking at her from where he's standing next to Chrom up there during the vows, and she can't help it.

She's thinking about it.

More than she wants a wedding, she wants a marriage to Lon'qu.

When the bride and groom kiss with too much tongue to really be appropriate for a wedding, everyone cheers and Ronkuu shouts _so_ loud and everyone laughs when Lon'qu gives his best man speech.

He tells everyone about the time he and Chrom had the terrible idea to sneak out one night and head for Vegas since it seemed brilliant until they settled for trying to make it to the nearest bar that was conveniently a gay strip club. And because he's an ass, he keeps talking into the microphone about Chrom's obsession with Star Wars and the road trip where they decided that if one of them died of starvation, the other just had to die of loneliness 'cause what else are friends for? Sometime after the story about the time Robin got her period in the backseat of Chrom's gently used car when they three were going to see Jaws premiere again in theaters, he had everyone laughing about the groom asking her on the phone which brand of tampons she wanted and how heavy her flow was and if the cardboard looking applicators hurt, Lon'qu sorta just stops, and he says that he's always been his best friend. And he's very honored to have met him and given him away to the crazy woman that wanted forever with him.

Everyone awww's. Chrom looks like he'll cry for the seventh time. Lon'qu says he should thank him for not telling the story about what could have been a gambling addiction and identity theft. Chrom tells him to shut up.

Sumia's bouquet hits the back of Lon'qu's head when she tosses it.

She dances with Frederick and then Ronkuu and then Sumia and then her parents and then Lissa and then Chrom, and when Lon'qu interrupts and asks for a dance, she smiles and politely excuses herself from Chrom.

"I like your speech." She said to him. He grins and spins her around, that goofy grin on his face.

And she realizes that she's glad she's here.

 **A/N: Wow, one chapter left. This has been an awesome, wild ride! Thank you all so much! Ilysm! The last chapter will be up soon.**


	10. Chapter Ten

The next time she sees him in a tie, it's months later.

He went to have dinner by himself with his parents. It was supposed to be fine.

She's wearing the ring a nurse found in his coat pocket when she was searching for identification, his blood type, whatever. She doesn't care about it when he's laying in a hospital gown and bloody and pale.

He was in the car with his dad, driving, and maybe he always had a car crash smile to begin with. They started to argue, and when Lon'qu said he was gonna ask Robin to marry him, a car came out of nowhere.

He's unconscious with what they think is just a concussion. Ronkuu has glass fragmented in his chest from where the windshield cracked. She and Ke'ri are waiting to hear from anyone that'll tell them how the surgery is going.

She decides she hates hospitals. She really does.

::::::::::::::::::::::::

About a week later, they're both home, both perfectly fine except so tired and so sorry.

They skirt around each other timidly and are overly polite to each other, and Ke'ri's just so done with both Ronkuu and Lon'qu that she kicks them out.

Her mom baked and brought over a ton of cookies she eats with Ke'ri now, and she's only vaguely worried her apparent future mother-in-law is going to ask her weird questions about her and Lon'qu and their life and future children's educations.

"He hasn't really asked yet," she tells her, pouring more milk in her glass. "He hasn't said anything about the ring either."

"Men in this family aren't romantic," Ke'ri shrugs, too used to it by now. Except the way she's smiling is thoughtful and reminiscent and she doesn't believe herself when she thinks back on Ronkuu.

"Lon'qu can be," she almost feels the need to justify, but then there it is - that look on Ke'ri's face.

She looks torn between curiosity and better not wanting to know, and it's.. it's all Robin can do to not grin like a lovestruck fool. It's so different than she ever thought it'd be.

She stares out the glass door to the backyard like she's seeing years ago, a little more than eleven, and there's so much she thought would be so.. so not like this that it makes her giggle and cackle like a crazy person, just oddly amazed and awed and so damned lucky here in the world that's been set for her.

Ke'ri stands after a minute of smiling at her chortles, leaning down to kiss the crown of her head. "I can't wait 'till you're legally one of us, not just a hostage," she teases. Because she knows everything, too, she's opening the front door when Lon'qu and Ronku pull up the drive in the Myrmidon.

They're laughing and shoving at each other like kids, but then Ronkuu and Ke'ri are kissing on the lawn like teenagers while Lon'qu sorta grimaces, closes the door behind him.

"Robin?" he calls, following his nose to the smell of cookies in the kitchen and exhaling happily when he catches sight of her at the table. "Hey."

"How'd it go," she wants to know, straightening up higher in her chair so she's hugging his waist when he steps into grabbing range.

"He was gonna take me fishing before we decided that was stupid." The corner of his mouth quirks up. "It was pretty good."

He smiles, a moot point since his lies of omission in the name of silence are just as bad, but his face is still in stitches, and his smile is so bright, and it's instinct to curl her fingers through his and follow him up, always up, the stairs to his room. "I wanted to ask you something, if now's okay."

The engagement ring on her left hand suddenly feels heavy and purposeful, and she tries to school her face, compose her expression. She's technically already agreed to marry him unspokenly, so this - fine, just fine. Perfect. "Now's okay," she assures him, nestling into his chest and wrapping her leg around both of his.

He pulls her closer to him, rests his chin atop her head. "I was going to ask you about the ring," he confesses after a minute of just holding onto each other.

She opens her eyes, feels her eyelashes dust against his neck tenderly. She tries to breathe, letting herself be soothed by his rhythmic fingertips slipping up the side of her shirt and ghosting featherlight touches into the waning dips of her ribs. "What about it?"

"You like it?" he mumbles, trying to fight his nervousness. He just kisses her forehead again.

"I like you," she grins, can't help it with how happy she feels, how right this is. "Might even love you," she quips like she doesn't tell him at every turn. There's so much of it pouring out of her, and all he does is yawn through his big, dopey grin.

He catches hold of her hand and twines their fingers together tight, tries to balance on the bed the seconds he's standing and she's giggling away so he won't crush her if he falls. He drops to one knee on the bed because really, by now it's about time they do marry each other. "I already know you'll say yes."

"Do you?" she challenges, arching an eyebrow.

He gives her that look she knows all too well, the one that's half-annoyed and half-in-love and both parts right here, right now, and he lifts her left hand, kisses her knuckle just above the lone solitary diamond marking her his in one more way that's a lot more elegant than a necklace of his teeth bitten into her neck or one of his old shirts hanging nearly to her knees.

It's the easiest, freest thing in the world to say yes. So she does. It sounds a lot like forever, tastes a lot like all their life, a laugh in his throat, her palms in his hands.

His brown eyes are closed, and she's drinking him in, every part of his soul she can't touch with her fingers. "How about tomorrow?" she wonders, only partially serious.

"We should elope, shouldn't we?" he grins, and he laughs, and she giggles into his neck.

Their life is tomorrow.

And it's perfect.

* * *

 **And so the curtains close on His Brown Eyes and the end of this Lon'qu and Robin's story. I hope you all loved this story as I loved writing it. Your feedback has meant the world to me and I appreciate it so much! I'd like to thank each and everyone of you for reading, favoriting, following, or reviewing. I'm hard at work on my next fic (another Awakening one)and I have a few one-shots planned in the future and I hope you'll give those a read too! Signing off for the last time on this fic,**

 **Worlds In My Head**


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